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Peer-reviewed Papers

  1. Bigal, E., Livne, L., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Morick, D., Einbinder, S., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A. (2025). Fatal shark incident in the eastern Mediterranean Sea highlights urgent need for enhanced management measures. Ocean & Coastal Management, 269, 107848.

  2. Mevorach, Y., Galili, O., Bigal, E., Goffman, O., Roditi-Elasar, M., Zuriel, Y., Kobo, K., Haitovich, Y., Hadar, N., Markovich, M., Scheinin, A. (2025). Bottlenose Dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) along the coast of Israel: Abundance and social structure. Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems, 35(8), e70181.

  3. Sørensen, O. J. R., van Rijn, I., Einbinder, S., Nativ, H., Scheinin, A., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Bigal, E., Livne, L., Tsemel, A., Bialik, O. M., Makovsky, Y. (2025). Bridging the gap in deep seafloor management: Ultra fine-scale ecological habitat characterization of large seascapes. Remote Sensing in Ecology and Conservation.

  4. Pickholtz, R., Shelter, O., Levy, L., Bigal, E., Levy, Y. (2024). Physiological and haematological changes caused by increased activity in captive sea turtles: A pilot study on the green sea turtle (Chelonia mydas).

  5. Bigal, E., Livne, L., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Levy, T., Shemesh, E., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A. (2024). Shark shuffle: Segregated co-occurrence of multiple dusky and sandbar lineages at a human-altered habitat in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Scientific Reports, 14, 19924.

  6. Azrieli, B., Cohen, E., Livne, L., Ramon, D., Tsemel, A., Bigal, E., Shemesh, E., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Barash, A., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A. (2024). Characterising a potential nearshore nursery ground for the blackchin guitarfish (Glaucostegus cemiculus) in Ma’agan Michael, Israel. Frontiers in Marine Science, 11, 1391752.

  7. Barash, A., Scheinin, A., Bigal, E., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Martinez, S., Davidi, A., Fadida, Y., Pickholtz, R., Tchernov, D. (2023). Some like it hot: Investigating thermoregulatory behaviour of carcharhinid sharks in a natural environment with artificially elevated temperatures. Fishes, 8(9), 428.

  8. Starostinetsky-Malonek, T., Scheinin, A., Aroch, I., Davidovich, N., Bigal, E., Livne, L., Hauser-Davis, R. A., Wosnick, N., Tchernov, D., Morick, D. (2023). First report on the serum chemistry and haematology of free-ranging dusky (Carcharhinus obscurus) and sandbar (Carcharhinus plumbeus) sharks in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Conservation Physiology, 11(1), coad037.

  9. Morick, D., Davidovich, N., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Kroin, Y., Bigal, E., Sierra, E., Segura-Göthlin, S., Wosnick, N., Hauser-Davis, R. A., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A. (2023). First description of a Gammaherpesvirus in a common dolphin (Delphinus delphis) from the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. Veterinary Research Communications, 47(4), 2253–2258.

  10. Bregman, G., Lalzar, M., Livne, L., Bigal, E., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Morick, D., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A., Meron, D. (2023). Preliminary study of shark microbiota at a unique mix-species shark aggregation site in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. Frontiers in Microbiology, 14, 1027804.

  11. Galili, O., Goffman, O., Roditi-Elasar, M., Mevorach, Y., Bigal, E., Zuriel, Y., Haitovich, Y., Hadar, N., Markovich, M., Vardimon, D., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A. (2023). Two decades of coastal dolphin population surveys in Israel, eastern Mediterranean. Biology, 12(2), 328.

  12. Barash, A., Scheinin, A., Bigal, E., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Martinez, S., Tchernov, D. (2023). Depth partitioning and diel movement of two large carcharhinid sharks in extremely shallow waters. Fishes, 8(2), 85.

  13. Morick, D., Blum, S. E., Davidovich, N., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Bigal, E., Peleg, I., Rokney, A., Nasie, I., Feldman, N., Flecker, M., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A. (2023). Photobacterium damselae subspecies damselae pneumonia in a dead stranded bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus), eastern Mediterranean Sea. Emerging Infectious Diseases, 29(1), 179.

  14. Bigal, E., Galili, O., van Rijn, I., Rosso, M., Cleguer, C., Hodgson, A., Scheinin, A., Tchernov, D. (2022). Reduction of species identification errors in surveys of marine wildlife abundance utilising unoccupied aerial vehicles (UAVs). Remote Sensing, 14(16), 4118.

  15. Zemah-Shamir, Z., Mourier, J., Ilany, A., Bigal, E., Scheinin, A., Tchernov, D. (2022). Preliminary insights of a mixed-species shark aggregation: A case study of two carcharhinids from the Mediterranean Sea. Environmental Biology of Fishes, 105(5), 623–634.

  16. Paraschiv, M., Padrino, R., Casari, P., Bigal, E., Scheinin, A., Tchernov, D., Fernández Anta, A. (2022). Classification of underwater fish images and videos via very small convolutional neural networks. Journal of Marine Science and Engineering, 10(6), 736.

  17. Morick, D., Davidovich, N., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Bigal, E., Rokney, A., Ron, M., Blum, S. E., Soto, E., Heckman, T. I., Lau, S. C., Wosnick, N., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A. (2022). First isolation and characterization of Streptococcus agalactiae from a stranded wild common dolphin (Delphinus delphis). Frontiers in Marine Science, 9, 824071.

  18. Morick, D., Davidovich, N., Bigal, E., Rosenbluth, E., Bouznach, A., Rokney, A., Ron, M., Wosnick, N., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A. (2020). Fatal infection in a wild sandbar shark (Carcharhinus plumbeus), caused by Streptococcus agalactiae, type Ia-ST7. Animals, 10(2), 284.

  19. Alexandri, T., Zemah-Shamir, Z., Bigal, E., Scheinin, A., Tchernov, D., Diamant, R. (2019). Localization of acoustically tagged marine animals in under-ranked conditions. IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing, 20(3), 1126–1137.

  20. Diamant, R., Kipnis, D., Bigal, E., Scheinin, A., Tchernov, D., Pinchasi, A. (2019). An active acoustic track-before-detect approach for finding underwater mobile targets. IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Signal Processing, 13(1), 104–119.

  21. Diamant, R., Bigal, E., Pinhasi, A., Scheinin, A. (2018). Estimation of shark biomass through active acoustics. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 144(3), 1912.

  22. Levy, D., Belfer, Y., Osherov, E., Bigal, E., Scheinin, A. P., Nativ, H., Tchernov, D., Treibitz, T. (2018). Automated analysis of marine video with limited data. Proceedings of the IEEE CVPR Workshops, 1385–1393.

  23. Bigal, E., Morick, D., Scheinin, A. P., Salant, H., Berkowitz, A., King, R., Levy, Y., Melero, M., Sánchez-Vizcaíno, J., Goffman, O., Hadar, N., Roditi-Elasar, M., Tchernov, D. (2018). Detection of Toxoplasma gondii in three common bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus); A first description from the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. Veterinary Parasitology, 258, 74–78.

Conference Communications

2023

  • Bigal, E., Scheinin, A.P., Tchernov, D. Long-term ecological research of apex marine predators in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. Sixth Mediterranean Sea Conference: Effective Management of the Sea (oral).

2022

  • Bigal, E., van Rijn, I., Galili, O., Rosso, M., Cleguer, C., Hodgson, A., Scheinin, A.P., Tchernov, D. Assessing the integration potential of unoccupied aerial vehicles (UAVs) with conventional cetacean surveys. European Cetacean Society (oral).

  • Galili, O., Bigal, E., Cleguer, C., Hodgson, A., Scheinin, A.P., Tchernov, D. Legislative feasibility of unoccupied aerial vehicle usage for environmental surveys in the ACCOBAMS region. European Cetacean Society (oral).

2019

  • Bigal, E. Tagging at aggregation hotspots in the easternmost Mediterranean Sea. International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Expert Meeting on Sharks and Rays in the Mediterranean Sea (oral).

  • Bigal, E., Diamant, R., Tchernov, D., Morick, D., Scheinin, A.P. Active acoustic sampling of highly migratory megafauna. European Elasmobranch Association (oral).

  • Bigal, E., Morick, D., Davidovich, N., Wosnick, N., Zemach Shamir, Z., Tchernov, D., Scheinin, A.P. Microbial infection in sharks as a bioindicator for the state of the environment in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. European Elasmobranch Association (poster).

  • Scheinin, A.P., Bigal, E., Zemach Shamir, Z., Barash, A., Starostinetsky-Malonek, T., Morick, D., Tchernov, D. Shark research hub for dusky sharks (Carcharhinus obscurus) and sandbar sharks (Carcharhinus plumbeus) in the easternmost Mediterranean Sea. European Elasmobranch Association (oral).

  • Starostinetsky-Malonek, T., Scheinin, A.P., Tchernov, D., Bigal, E., Aroch, I., Morick, D. Blood biochemistry and hematology of dusky sharks (Carcharhinus obscurus) and sandbar sharks (Carcharhinus plumbeus) in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. European Elasmobranch Association (oral).

  • Barash, A., Bigal, E., Scheinin, A., Zemach Shamir, Z., Martines, S., Tchernov, D. Habitat use of dusky and sandbar sharks at a warm water discharge of a coastal power plant. 2nd Israeli Conference for Conservation Science (oral).

2018

  • Morick, D., Bigal, E., Scheinin, A.P., Salant, H., Berkowitz, A., Tchernov, D. Toxoplasmosis in common bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus). International Association for Aquatic Animal Medicine (oral).

  • Bigal, E., Morick, D., Scheinin, A.P., Salant, H., Berkowitz, A., King, R., Levy, Y., Melero, M., Sánchez-Vizcaíno, J.M., Goffman, O., Hadar, N., Roditi-Elasar, M., Tchernov, D. Toxoplasmosis and herpesvirus in common bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus); a first report from the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. European Cetacean Society (oral).

  • Scheinin, A.P., Marco, S., Reininger, D., Bigal, E., Haitovich, Y. Delphis – an open-source coastal cetacean survey app. European Cetacean Society (oral).

  • Bigal, E., Barash, A., Scheinin, A.P., Tchernov, D. Introduction of the shark tagging programme in Israel and preliminary results from the first two seasons. European Elasmobranch Association (oral).

Research Grants

  • 2024–2026 · Yad Hanadiv Foundation
    Natural habitats of marine species — Lead author, primary researcher

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  • 2023–2026 · Israel Ministry of Energy
    Distribution and habitat use of Atlantic Bluefin Tuna in the Mediterranean marine space of Israel — Lead author, primary researcher

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  • 2022 · Israel Nature and Parks Authority
    Behavioural response of sharks to anthropogenic disturbances at a coastal aggregation area — Researcher

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  • 2020–2021 · Data Science Research Center (University of Haifa)
    Collection and automated annotation of marine megafauna footage obtained from unmanned aerial vehicles — Lead author, primary researcher

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  • 2018–2021 · Israel Ministry of Defense
    Classified project — Co-author, researcher

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  • 2018–2020 · Agreement on the Conservation of Cetaceans of the Black Sea, Mediterranean Sea and contiguous Atlantic Area (ACCOBAMS)
    Feasibility study and experimentation on the use of drones for cetacean monitoring in the ACCOBAMS Agreement Area — Lead author, researcher

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  • 2017–2019 · European Union Horizon 2020
    SYMBIOSIS – A holistic opto-acoustic system for monitoring marine biodiversity — Co-author, researcher

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  • 2017–2019 · Israel Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (Fishery & Mariculture Division)
    Assessment of jellyfish swarm size and movement relative to fish farms — Lead author, researcher

Eyal Bigal, PhD

Postdoctoral Fellow; Block Lab

Hopkins Marine Station

120 Ocean View Blvd.

Pacific Grove, CA 93950, USA

Stanford University

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